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One of my favorite blogs to read is The Suburban Prepper.  Living in very urban Salt Lake City myself, the ability to discern and proactively avoid bad situations is a survival skill I can’t afford to let atrophy.  I read a post there a while back titled Man-imals.  Go read it.  You will fall into one of the following categories of people after reading it:

1. My eyes are opened
2. What is this guy smoking?
3. Duh.  I’ve known this for years!

Hopefully you don’t fall into category 2.  That would be unfortunate…  You can vote at the bottom of this post and let everyone know where you fall!

Since this site is geared towards the people of Utah, I wanted to expand on his post with what I view as Utah-focused ideas and observations.  Living in Utah is simultaneously a blessing and curse in regards to disaster preparedness and dealing with emergent situations…

Blessings:

1. The fact that there is a good sense of community and “togetherness” for most Utahns can’t be ignored.  When it gets down to it, I believe the people and communities in Utah will (for the most part; depends on the length and severity of the disaster) band together and help each other through the event.
2. With a large population of LDS members many should, theoretically at least, be more prepared for a natural disaster than others in different parts of the country.  Everyone knows the LDS church advocates and instructs members to maintain a store of food for when times are rough.  While not all members heed this advice, others outside the church in Utah understand the wisdom of such direction even if they don’t agree with other beliefs.  Going to stores and talking to others of all faiths, I think overall the people of Utah are doing well with this.
3. We are still a medium-sized city (talking Salt Lake valley here of course).  It gets harder for any organization, whether it’s the government, churches, private individuals, etc… to provide relief after an event as population size and density grows.  It’s the essence of “supply and demand” in economics.  Too many mouths to feed, not enough food or relief workers.  Luckily we’re not a New York or Chicago.  Living there would be nightmarish! (and I don’t just mean during a disaster either)

Curses:

1. In the same breath of considering the sense of community in Utah, you must recognize and consider the inherit divide between “Mormons” and “non-Mormons”.  For most it’s nothing intentional while others (on both sides) butt heads at every occasion.  This should be something both groups give serious consideration prior to a disaster occuring.  Not to trivialize high school but that’s what I think about when I consider the religious divide that needlessly exists here.  Yes, I said NEEDLESSLY!  Unfortunately, it’s also something that can only be cured before a disaster strikes.  You aren’t going to be mending many fences (literal or figurative) when you’re struggling just to get clean water and food in your body.  Quite the opposite: each group will cling to each other; their lives may very well depend on it.
2. Knowing that a good many Utahns have some kind of food storage and other preparations can be a weakness as well as strength.  Those struggling will be more prone to target those they know (or believe) might have something they want.  It’s not about how well off you are, it’s about how well off you are relative to anyone else…  Think about that before the next time you start spouting out the nitty gritty details of your food storage plan to someone.  You might not be concerned about telling your coworker those details at this moment.  Of course, at this moment their stomachs are full or have been in the past 6 hours…

Now, those “curses” sound like a lot of gloom and doom, it really just depends on what level of disaster your planned preparations are designed for.  If you are just concerned about a bad snow storm or even an earthquake that takes out 1/3 of the houses in the Salt Lake valley, this may be a bit overkill.  I happen to believe much worse could happen and while I maintain faith in the general good nature of those around me, I can’t risk ignorance in preparing for the real monsters of this world in all shapes, sizes, and forms.

It’s about being prepared for the worst while praying and striving for the best; in both disasters and our fellow citizens.

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